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Tuesday, April 30, 2013

Happy May! It's my very merry blogversary! I plan on having a minimum of four give aways this month so you will want to check back regularly. This is my second anniversary and I am celebrating my crafty journey with you. I am so happy for the friends I've made and and feel so blessed to have you in my life. This is my small way of saying thank you for your kindness and encouragement. I'm a little on the fence with my first treat of the month. .. this set of cards that I made with the Serendipity Stamps months. Here's the thing - if you are following me chances are that you are a crafter yourself, and perhaps you have an entire arsenol of cards that you've created yourself. However, if you are like me - you collect hand made cards from your friends like trading cards of your favorite base ball players. So maybe you want the cards, maybe you don't... here's where I'm going to sweeten the deal a little - I'm going to include a set of the month stamps with the cards so you can have some fun of your own. I love the way the months have little images that are appropriate for each month that theyrepresent and I hope you do too!

Here's photos of the cards I made!

Ok so if you'd like this set of cards with a set of the month stamps LEAVE ME A COMMENT. I will pick one random winner from the comments left on this post between now and May 31.

Hi everyone! I have two posts today - if you are looking for my 12 Kits of the Holidays - please scroll down - you will want to check this post out as well because there is some blog candy to be had!! So glad you stopped by today! I'm so excited to share with you part of the new Serendipity Spring Release! Today the design team is featuring the new pear stamp and die set. The set features a fancy die cut pear, a matching pear set and a sweet sentiment. These items are also available separately. To show you some of the possibilities I used the die and the stamp on different projects. My first card features the die cut pear in gold foil on a card loaded with lots of trims and embellishments.

For my second card I inked up the stamp in different colors. This was easy to do using the tear drop shaped ink pads - I used Memento. First I inked up the bottom edge of the pear with red. Next I inked up the entire part (yes even the part I inked in red) with Cantaloupe. Last I inked up the stem.

I added a little button topped with a gem as an embellishment. The sentiment is stamped on the pattern paper, and across the top is a simple border punch and ribbon.

I hope you will see what the rest of the design team made with this beautiful new intricate die. Just click on their names below. And please leave a comment. One lucky winner will receive the pear stamp and die set! You have until 5-3-13 to leave a comment to be included in the drawing. The winner will be announced on 5-6-13 on the Serendipity Stamps blog.

Monday, April 29, 2013

Welcome to the April Edition of the 12 Kits of Holidays. We used to be the 12 Kits of Christmas but decided to add some other holidays in here as well this year. Just to refresh your memory, the 12 Kits is a group of 12 designers. We've each been assigned one month to supply goodies to the rest of the group. We all get the same ingredients to work with and on the last day of the month we reveal our creations! It's interesting to see how we all use the same ingredients just a little differently to showcase our own style. The hostess this month is Ms. Sharron Gregory of On Papillon Wings blog.

Sharron's style is C&S and it seems obvious to me that she loves nature. It's not unusual to see flowers, butterflies, animals and birds on her creations. Just check out this amazing kit Sharron put together for us - My Mind's Eye "Winter Wonderland" paper, stamps from Plum Purdy and lots of embellishments. And the nature thing? I can't believe I made 7 (yep you read it right!) this time. I think I could have kept going too!! I will keep it short - promise. So without further delay - straight to the designs!!!

Santa

Joy Tag

Cozy Cottage

Christmas Cookies

Carrot Nose Frosty

Jingle

Red Bird

Wanna see what the rest of the group did with the same kit? Just click on their names below to hop on over to their blogs!

Sunday, April 28, 2013

How about some gorgeous inspiration from The Ribbon Reel Challenge Blog? This one was picked out by Keilly and is appropriately called "Love Letters". You are instructed to create a project using the colors in the inspiration photo and be sure to include a button, ribbon and twine. Lots of things you can focus in on here - buttons, stamps, cards, doilies, twine, hearts, flowers - you get the picture! I picked up on lots of those elements but the one that caught my eye first was the botanical print in red , wrapped in twine in the bottom left corner. The rest sort of just fell into place and you won't hear me complain about that!

Need a little more inspiration? Check out what the rest of the design team came up with for this one! We'd love it if you would join us!

Saturday, April 27, 2013

When I saw the Monday Mood Board over at WPlus9 I sort of hesitated about playing this week. I saw the seaside inspiration and immediately thought of the "Guiding Light" set that has been on my wish list for a long time. I don't have it so I guess I felt discouraged. Like a moth to a flame I checked the site again yesterday and saw that lots of other people didn't have that set either - I expect most of us are buying more current sets before we can go back for older sets that we adore. I felt inspired by the other designs I saw and got determined to make the most of what I do have.It's been a few years since I've seen the ocean. When my kids were younger it seemed like it was never a problem to take them out of school for a sea side escape. These past few years it seems like it's been harder and harder to get everyone's schedules together (like aligning planets) and I've been dreaming about going back again. I'll paint a picture in words with my romantic notions of the ocean. Picture yourself walking barefoot in the sand. You are wearing a white battenburg lace dress, feeling the wind on your face, smelling the fresh salt air, and picking up little trinkets washed up by the waves - sea glass, shells - all made smooth from the waves and the sand.... Are you there yet?

Friday, April 26, 2013

Have you been playing along with the Waltzingmouse Christmas Card Challenge? This is anopportunity to make a few Christmas cards each month so that you won’t be in a panic come December. It's also a great way to get some inspiration for how to put good use to those Waltzingmouse stamps. We all know that December brings enough panic making preparations and gift buying without adding the pressure of having to make 50 cards in one month, so why not get started today? You can see the latest challenge and get more information here.Here's the good part - prizes are to be had and you can start joining the challenges any time you like - meaning if you're like me and didn't get to the February challenge until April - that's ok. Post your project in April and link it up to the Gallery and leave a comment in the forum so other visitors can check it out.

I'm still determined to get caught up so here is my submission for the March challenge which was a little trixie! A color challenge of - get this - lime and navy. Well I figured I can mix colors up with the best of them - red and purple, pink and red - but I can honestly say I've never done a navy and lime card until this one. I stamped the snowflake background in Navy and that big ole Santa shoe print with the engraved tree in the lime green. I think the colors added to the whimsy of the shoe print! I had to add some gems because to me Christmas is all about the magic.

I hope it makes you smile - and maybe inspire you a bit to play along with the challenge. There's enough magic in Christmas to spread around the whole year!

Wednesday, April 24, 2013

Time for your weekly does of CASE Study Inspiration. Our muse this month is the incredibly talented JJ Bolton of Ribbon Girls Blog. JJ has such a clean style - always full of color, and usually some thought provoking element. This week's inspiration photo includes a silhouette image of a girl flying a kite that sails in a sunny sky.

Now I realize my card probably looks really simple to most of you, but I have to tell you how proud I am for creating my very first cloudy sky background! I always say CASE makes me try new things and here's another good example of something I've been putting off because it looked way too complicated to me. It was actually easier than I thought and it only took a few tries before I was happy with the shape of my clouds and the ratio of blue to white. I found lots of tutorials on Utube. I just used a piece of hand cut card stock and some Ranger/Tim Holtz distress ink.

Tuesday, April 23, 2013

Have you been playing along with the Waltzingmouse Christmas Card Challenge? This is an opportunity to make a few Christmas cards each month so that you won’t be in a panic come December. It's also a great way to get some inspiration for how to put good use to those Waltzingmouse stamps. We all know that December brings enough panic making preparations and gift buying without adding the pressure of having to make 50 cards in one month, so why not get started today? You can see the latest challenge and get more information here.

Here's the good part - prizes are to be had and you can start joining the challenges any time you like - meaning if you're like me and didn't get to the February challenge until April - that's ok. Post your project in April and link it up to the Gallery and leave a comment in the forum so other visitors can check it out!

February's challenge was to incorporate a heart into your project. I stamped the striped candies from "Candy Jar Christmas Fillers" and die cut them into heart shapes to go along with the "Candy Wagon" image. The hard part for me was deciding if I like it better in red or green. I'll let you decide.

Hi I'm Jeanne!

A Kept Life

When I left my full time career job my husband started calling me his "kept wife". The name of my blog is a play on that expression, because now I capture moments in photographs, and create in color in my "kept life". I hope you enjoy - thanks for stopping by!